Zuma’s jet part of ‘master plan’

Erika Gibson

PRESIDENT Jacob Zuma’s presidential jet Inkwazi was part of a “master plan” to fly the president out of Cape Town in case protest at his State of the Nation address descended into anarchy.

The private jet’s crew, technicians and staff at the air force command were placed in readiness from last Thursday. 

It is not known when they were stood down. Beeld has learnt confidentially that Inkwazi had flown Zuma to Cape Town on Monday and then returned to the ­Waterkloof air force base in Pretoria to ­undergo maintenance work.


Zuma was scheduled to fly back only on Saturday evening. Meanwhile, a security team comprising police and state security drew up their master security plan, which included blocking the cellphone signal from ­Parliament.

The details of the plan are not known, but included sending hundreds of police officers to Cape Town to implement it in case of riots or anarchy, in which case the presidential jet would also rush to whisk Zuma back to safety in Pretoria.

A former air force officer could not ­remember any other president who required such extreme security measures. Spokesperson for the presidency Mac Maharaj said Zuma had no say in the ­planning of his security, but this was ­determined by the relevant departments, namely the police, the army and state ­security.
He said while they did not expect the worst case scenario, they still had to plan for it.